What once ensured that I sat at a table next to the teacher is now posted, Monday through Friday.

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Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Part One: Awoken by a Cat; or I Hope My Insurance Doesn't Hear about This

I’m pretty sure I’ve closed my eyes for just a moment.

“Pearl. Psssst.”

Huh? What? I jerk awake.

The cat is sitting on my chest.

Liza Bean Bitey, of the Minneapolis Biteys, symmetrically
striped stealer of dreams and small-pawed liberator of earrings, pens, and
unattended cash cards peers down at me.
Her eyes narrowed to gleaming slits, she looks as if she’s suppressing a
smile.

I move my own eyes to the left, to the right. The TV is on, murmuring something indistinct
about what we may expect in the way of side effects.

I stare up at the cat.

“What,” I say.

“You were snoring.”

I shift slightly, and the cat hangs on to her dignity –
and her position as chest-sitter – by extending her claws.

“Why,” she says, “don’t you go to bed?”

“Huh?” I pull my
glasses off, rub the bridge of my nose. “What
time is it?”

The cat raises her left paw, checks the inside of her
wrist. “2:30.”

I sit up, knocking the cat backwards. “What are you
talking about,” I say. I feel, somehow,
defensive. “It can’t be 2:30,” I
say. “I have to work tomorrow.”

The cat jumps to the coffee table. “What nonsense you talk,” she says
dismissively. “It certainly can be 2:30.” Liza Bean yawns
delicately.

I catch a whiff of something – and wake up just that much
more. “Let me smell your breath,” I say.

The cat covers her mouth with a tiny, larcenous paw, stifles a small smile. “You have some strange habits, Pearl. Don’t ever let anyone tell you differently.”

I frown at her, consciously reach up to smooth my brow.

The lousy cat is giving me wrinkles.

“I’m serious,” I say.

“Oh,” the cat says, laughing. “I’m sure you are.”

I lean forward, but she is too quick. Dancing backwards, she evades my grasp.

“Did you take my car again? You did, didn’t you?!”

Just a week ago, the cat had taken my car, returned it
with a full tank of gas – and a half-eaten bucket of bait in the back
seat. At the time, it hadn’t seemed all
that important. I mean, a kitty’s got to
eat, am I right?

And a tank of gas – well, you’ve seen the price at the
pump.

Still…

“Liza Bean,” I say.
“Did you take my car again?”

The cat smiles, leaps up to the top perch of “cat condo” in
the corner of the room.